


Late Night Drama

by coldflashwavebaby



Series: Late Night with Len And Barry [1]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012), DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst and Feels, Barry is his producer, Diva Leonard Snart, Hangover, Len has a Late Night Television show, M/M, Past Drug Use, Post-Break Up, Prompt Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-11
Updated: 2017-06-11
Packaged: 2018-11-12 18:01:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11167131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coldflashwavebaby/pseuds/coldflashwavebaby
Summary: Len is the host of his own late night show "Late Night with Leonard Snart". Barry is his executive producer/ex-boyfriend.Somehow, it works.





	Late Night Drama

**Author's Note:**

> lincolnburrowss asked: “Back then, I lied when I told you I didn’t love you. You needed to move on from me– I needed to protect you from me.” for coldflash please :)
> 
> Okay, there’s a funny story behind the inspiration for this one, which is I was watching clips from ‘The Muppets’ TV show (You know, the one where Miss Piggy has the show, and Kermit is her EP, and it’s sort of like 30 Rock?) while trying to come up with ideas, and I thought ‘OH MY GOSH, A COLDFLASH AU!’, and so this was born.

            The job of an executive producer was hard. Especially when no one else seemed to want to work.

            First stop, writer’s room.

            Barry knocked on the open door, shaking his head when he saw Cisco, Nate, and Ray standing over a sleeping HR, permanent markers in hand.

            “Hey!” He called before the ink touched the writer’s face. They all froze in place, guilty expressions on their faces. “Everything ready for rehearsals?”

            They nodded, and Barry rolled his eyes as he checked _‘Writers goofing off, but somehow completed their work’,_ off his list. “Carry on.” He announced, turning to walk back out. Sometimes, he just needed to choose his battles. He passed Caitlin, the stage manager, on his way to his next stop—the band.

            “The writers are using HR’s face as an easel again.” He warned.

            She let out a deep sigh. “I’ve told them.” She stomped towards the writer’s room, and Barry didn’t envy a single one of them. He headed for the stage, where Wally, Jesse, Linda, and Jax were warming up.

            Wally was the first to notice him approaching. “Hey, Bare!”

            He waved with his pen. “You guys picked a song for tonight? You know Kara Danvers is our guest tonight, and she wants to perform with you guys.”

            Linda and Jax were practically buzzing with excitement, but Jesse, keeping it cool, just grinned. “We’re gonna blow her away. Don’t worry about it.”

            He was trying not to. He couldn’t help but have flashbacks to the Beyoncé incident last season. “Fingers crossed.” He said instead. He looked up at the stage lights, frowning when he saw Curtis positioned precariously on top of one, messing with the wires.

            “Rene?” He all but ran for the other stagehand, who was kicked back beside the ladder that lead to the catwalk. “Why is your boyfriend messing with dangerous equipment without a harness? And without telling anyone?”

            “He told me.” Rene replied unhelpfully. “Don’t worry, hoss. He knows what he’s doing…most of the time. He probably won’t fall.”

            That was almost no comfort. He was about to chew Rene and Curtis out, drag the latter down by his ear if he had to, but a call over his headset stopped him.

            _“Barry, you told me to let you know when Snart got here.”_ Iris said through their talkies.

            Barry turned away from Rene. “And?”

            _“Well, he’s here. But he’s hungover as hell. He tried to hide it, but he must have had a lot last night. I think you should come back here.”_

The last thing he wanted was to see Len when he was already stressed about the rest of the show. This was their season premiere—after all the bad publicity their so-called ‘star’ had gotten recently, they needed a good opening if the show was going to survive.

            He sighed. “Iris, I’ll be there in a minute. Just…make sure he makes it to his dressing room and that he’s drinking lots of water. The last thing we need is for him to keel over from dehydration.”

            _“Got it. I’ll get Mick to help.”_

Barry spared one more glance back at Rene. “Curtis better be off that light by the time I get in here, or I’m siccing Caitlin _and_ Laurel on you.”

            Honestly, they were the best threat he had, between Caitlin’s mothering and Laurel’s legal talk, _no one_ wanted to cross them. He broke out into a run for the stage door. Sara—the on-air announcer—was waiting for him, holding out a red Gatorade.

            “I heard Leonard was out late again. Can he do rehearsals, or do I need to come up with an explanation for Kara?”

            The fact that he and Sara had a system for this sort of thing was sad. He accepted the Gatorade. “Just…hold off for a moment. Let me talk to him and I’ll get back to you.”

            She nodded, following him most of the way to Len’s dressing room. It was a bright blue door, far from anyone else’s dressing rooms or offices, with a white snowflake on it instead of a star. When they’d started the show, it was a running gag between him and Len. Now, it fit so horribly well with their lives.

            He raised his hand to knock, but it opened before his fingers touched the wood. Mick, Len’s assistant, poked his head out, relief softening his features when he saw it was Barry.

            “Good. He needs you.” He only opened it wide enough for Barry to slip inside.

            “How bad is it?” Barry whispered, staring at the curtain that separated the front of the room from the ‘resting area’—the one with Len’s vanity and couch. He could see Len laid out on the couch through the thin fabric, still and quiet.

            “On a scale from one to ‘Lewis showing his ugly face again’, I’d give it a ‘The day Valentina Vostok purposely leaked their sex tape’.”

            Barry cringed. That’d been a really bad day. “What happened?”

            Mick’s eyebrows raised, like Barry was the biggest moron he’d ever seen. “Don’t you know what last night was?”

            He furrowed his brow. It was a Sunday. Sunday, March 16th—

            “Damn.” Barry groaned, palming his face. “Was that really yesterday? Alright, I’ll…I’ll take care of this. Just, go and tell Sara to prepare for the worst for now.”

            Mick darted from the room, eager to be far away from the drama that was about to ensure. Gathering his nerve, Barry stepped through the curtain.

            Len was still wearing his sunglasses, his hand resting on his forehead to massage away the pain. A water bottle hung from his other hand.

            Barry took a seat at the foot of the couch. Len didn’t acknowledge his presence. He shook his head. Len had been doing so good—he’d cleaned up his act, stopped drinking, stopped drugs, stayed out of the papers. Then, over the summer, everything suddenly changed.

            Out of nowhere, Leonard Snart was all over the tabloids—at clubs, at after-parties, getting drunk and throwing up in storm drains. Luckily, he hadn’t gone back to the drugs, as far as Barry knew.

            “Stop staring.” Len mumbled, still not moving. “You’re thinking too loud.”

            Barry rolled his eyes. “I’d ask how your feeling, but if it’s anything like how you look, I can assume the answer is ‘shitty’.”

            Len barked out a laugh, followed by a groan. “It hurts to do anything.” He moaned. “Pain killers?”

            Barry shook his head. “Sorry. No drugs. You’re a recovering addict remember.”

            “I’m hardly going to go back to shooting up because I took a Tylenol.” He grumbled, sitting up so his back was against the arm of the couch.

            “Honestly, I don’t know where your head’s at right now.” Barry shot back. “So, what you’ll be getting is a Gatorade and zero pity from anyone here over your hangover.”

            Len rolled his eyes, but accepted the bottle Barry offered him.

            “Now, are we going to talk about what the hell you’ve been doing these past months, or are you going to yell at me again and try to have me kicked off the lot?”

            A smile tugged at the corner of Len’s lips, but only for a second. “What I get up to isn’t your problem anymore, Allen. My life outside of this studio is my life.”

            Oh, so that’s how it was going to be. “Actually,” Barry scoffed, “it _is_ my business when it starts carrying over into your work, or when the bad publicity you’ve been stirring up starts affecting the ratings of _my_ show.”

            “Funny, I thought it was _my_ show. You know, since my name is in the title: _Late Night with Leonard Snart._ ”

            Barry’s nostrils flared. This shit—this _exact shit_ _and attitude_ —is why they weren’t together anymore. Len’s head getting too big, becoming an insatiable diva, mistreating a lot of the crewmembers on the show. Finally, on March 16th, Barry had enough. They’d been having dinner with some big wigs from the studio, and Len had started bad-mouthing their friends from the show. At that point, Barry’d had enough.

            “Those people work their asses off for you, Len!” He’d shouted after storming out of the restaurant. Len, who’d chased him out, snorted.

            “Come on, Barry. You complain about them, too. They goof off, almost never get their work done in time for the show, always make mistakes you have to clean up—”

            “It doesn’t matter, Len! What matters is that those people in there—the ones you were running your mouth to—can get them all _fired._ Do you understand that? All of those people who have dedicated their lives to making our show great, who sacrifice their social lives by staying behind until well past midnight to make sure everything is perfect, who are there _right now_ planning tomorrow night’s show, _those_ are the people you just sold out in there. And now I’m going to have to grovel to some studio head so that they don’t all lose their jobs!”

            The Len he knew and loved would’ve, upon realizing what he’d done, run back inside and tried to fix things, if not for their friends, then for Barry. But, instead, he laughed in Barry’s face. “If they cared about their jobs that much, they’d actually work to keep them. Maybe what my show needs is some fresh faces and new ideas.” He took Barry by the hand. “We’ll talk about it later though. Come on, Scarlet, let’s finish dinner.”

            But Barry couldn’t. He yanked his hand from his boyfriend’s grasp and stepped away. “No. I can’t…I can’t do this anymore, Len.”

            Len raised an eyebrow. “You’re breaking up with me? Over _this_?”

            He hadn’t wanted to. But he’d known that he needed to. “Yes. Because the man I love should be worried that what he says and does could put hard-working people out of their jobs. Should care that about someone other than himself.”

            He’d walked away right after that, leaving Len standing alone outside the restaurant. When they’d come in the next day for work, they interacted only when they had to, and mostly spoke through Mick.

            It hadn’t helped things when TMZ got their hands on a cellphone video of the break up and decided to run it. That had sparked another fight between them, right in the middle of the soundstage in front of most of their crew. They avoided each other for nearly two weeks after that.

            One year later, they were finally getting to a place where he thought they could work together without any…underlining feelings.

            Of course, Len was still a handful on a good day and a full-blown bastard on a medium day. He didn’t like to even think about bad days.

            Barry jumped to his feet. “For now. Did you know that I had a meeting with Eobard Thawne? You know, the man who holds all of our jobs in the palm of his hand? He told me that, if you don’t get your act together, this whole show is getting cut from the lineup. I had to _beg_ him to give you another shot. Do you know how degrading that is—begging a man like Thawne? _I owe him a favor now!”_

He could see the tension in Len’s shoulders, but the diva huffed. “It can’t be _that_ bad.”

            “What the hell is wrong with you?” Barry demanded. “For months, you’ve been stomping around like a spoiled child, doing whatever the hell you want without thinking about the people whose lives you affect. Ever since…”

            He paused, thinking back to the first day he’d noticed something wrong with Len. It was the night after Oliver Queen came on the show, the night he’d asked Barry out.

            “Is that what all of this is about?” He asked. “Is this about you being upset that someone asked me out? Or just that he asked me over you? Is that why you’ve been making an ass of yourself for months?”

            Len snorted and turned his head away. “Maybe not everything I do is about you, Barry? Have you ever thought of that?”

            Barry had had enough. “Fine. Whatever. Just…be at rehearsal in ten minutes, or I’m sending Sara in here to drag you out.”

            His head snapped back around. “You wouldn’t.”

            Barry huffed as he strode back to the door. “Don’t push me, Len.”

0000000

            Rehearsal went better than expected. The song the band picked was fun and Kara seemed to enjoy singing it with them. They ran through the schedule for the show without a hitch. The material from the writers was genuinely funny and witty. Even Len did amazing, given his state.

            By the end, Barry felt a weight lift off his shoulders, like maybe Thawne would let them keep their show longer than the six months he’d promised. His phone buzzed.

            _Oliver Queen_

He stepped backstage to take it.

            “Hey, Ollie.”

            _“Hey, Barry. How’s rehearsal going?”_

Barry sighed. “Stressful, but so far, pretty good. The worse part so far has been Len. I had to fight him to get serious about the show.”

            _“Well, you know from experience what a primadonna he can be.”_

“That’s harsh, Ollie.” He defended, even though Oliver was completely right. “He’s going through something right now. I just wish he’d tell me what was going on.”

            There was a deep sigh on the other end of the line. _“Bare, you have a big heart. It’s one of those wonderful, loveable things I adore about you. But it’s not your job to worry about him outside of the studio anymore. If he wants to crash and burn, you shouldn’t make yourself sick about it. He has to want to save himself.”_

“I know.” Barry agreed. “I just…when you’ve cared about someone for years, it doesn’t just go away, y’know? I’m always going to want to help him.”

            _“I know, Barry. I know.”_ Oliver didn’t sound jealous, just concerned. _“Do you want to go out for dinner tonight? Get your mind off of things?”_

Barry pursed his lips, thinking hard. “Not tonight. Maybe this weekend? There’s so much going on here right now. I need to be here.”

            _“I understand. I’ll call you tomorrow.”_

He felt eyes on his back as he hung up, and he turned to see Len hovering behind him. “I’m sorry.”

            Barry’s eyes widened. Had something happened? Was Len replaced by a clone? Was it April Fool’s? Len _never_ apologized.

            “I’ve been…unfair to you.” He continued. “I was upset that you moved on so quickly from our relationship. I guess I thought that…that maybe this wasn’t permanent. That it was just a fight, and we’d be getting back together. Then, you and Queen started dating, and I realized…I realized it was really over. You were done with me. I tried to go out and pretend that I was moving on with my life, too. And maybe I was purposely trying to hurt you, I don’t know. But you don’t deserve any of the hateful things I’ve said or done. And no one in this studio deserves to get fired because I can’t move on.

            “I know that, during that big fight we had, I told you that you were just a fad, and that what we had was a passing fancy, but I didn’t mean it, Scarlet. Back then…I was angry and hated myself for making you leave. I lied when I told you I didn’t love you, because you needed to move on from me– I needed to protect you from me.”

            He hung his head. “I’m a train wreck. I always have been, since my father forced me into this life. Between the drugs, and the tabloid stories, and the constant hook-ups…Barry, you were the best thing I’ve ever had. I thought that maybe you could help me be better, but instead I just started dragging you down, too. You deserve better than me, everyone here does. But if I can help you all keep your jobs, I swear, I’ll try.”

            It was the most honest he’d heard Len be in so long, and it was the first time he’d openly discussed their break-up since it happened. If he’d said those things a few months before, Barry would’ve rushed into his arms, forgiven him completely, and kissed the sorrow away.

            But things had changed. Maybe there was no going back for them—at least, for the time being. But damn, did he still love him. He just couldn’t stop.

            Len headed back for the soundstage without another word, leaving a shocked-silent Barry behind. _“Barry!”_ Caitlin’s voice came through his headset, jarring him from his paralysis.

            “Yeah?”

            _“Did you tell Curtis to mess with the satellite on the roof? Because he and Rene are heading up that way with tin foil, duct tape, a screwdriver, and a ladder.”_

Barry cursed. He’d have to deal with Len and all of their troubles later. For now, he had a show to run.


End file.
